To understand why the outlook for the Chilean “miracle” is so grim and investment is plummeting, look no further than this government’s obsession with holding back those who would skate ahead of the pack.

Ms. Bachelet has increased tax rates on everything from capital to consumption. One objective is to soak the investor class, making it poorer so that income inequality goes down. But it is more likely that income disparities will go up since the rich have ways to shelter income while the poor depend on job creation from investment to earn their daily bread and build wealth.

Additionally, Bachelt will end school vouchers,

The new law, which passed the lower house last month and now goes to the senate, would prohibit students from using vouchers to attend for-profit schools and prohibit schools that receive public subsidies from charging parents a co-payment. What is more, schools will no longer be allowed to select students because, apparently, it is “unfair” for gifted children to learn at their own speed.

That’s a bit of a stretch; Obama’s playing golf and dancing in Martha’s Vineyard, but,

A total of 37,477 children have been released to an appropriate adult sponsor, usually a parent, relative or family friend, according to the Office of Refugee Resettlement. Those children, who have been settled in all 50 states, would all be eligible to attend public school.

Some of those children may have been schooled in their native countries; none know how to speak, write, or read English.

The onerous burden on all school districts affected is about to start.

Guidance released Monday by the U.S. Department of Education about the unaccompanied minors also pointed out that unaccompanied minors in the custody of sponsors could be eligible for benefits under the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act.
. . .
The VDOE memo reiterated the requirement that school divisions “must immediately enroll homeless students” and must do so regardless of whether or not they are able “to produce the records required for enrollment.”

Let me ask a question, are the millions of minority American schoolchildren stuck in substandard and failing schools now able to enroll anywhere regardless of whether or not they are able “to produce the records required for enrollment?

In a letter sent to colleagues in the department after the sit-in, Rust said students in the demonstration described grammar and spelling corrections he made on their dissertation proposals as a form of “micro-aggression.”

Ponder that:

graduate school students

in “education and information”

who haven’t mastered grammar

in their dissertation proposals

staging a protest when, maybe for the first time in their lives, they come across a professor who’s doing them a favor

because they feel that not letting them get away with their errors is a form of micro-aggressive racism.

Plweez!

The protestors are upset that Professor Rust also corrected their citations and their bibliographies.

As a Latina, I particularly resent the students’ premise that this constitutes racism. I fully understand that grammar for bilinguals sometimes is tricky. However, all education that is worth its name is rigorous by nature. Deal with it, kids.

(As an aside, spell-check and grammar-check are your friends.)

Indeed, graduate students in Education and Information ought to be embarrassed that their work is substandard. A dissertation is not a quiz: it’s a work that takes months to complete. A dissertation proposal by definition must be carefully drafted, and ought to be subject to scrutiny.

Thousands of striking teachers seized two of Mexico City’s central thoroughfares on a double-pronged march to the president’s residence Wednesday, spawning choking knots of traffic chaos after definitively losing their battle to block new educational reforms less than 24 hours earlier.

The teachers disrupted the center of one of the world’s largest cities for at least the 14th time in two months, decrying a plan that tries to break union control of Mexico’s dysfunctional education system by requiring regular standardized teacher evaluations.

Enough people were angry at the teachers union (CNTE, pronounced CENT-eh) to make #EstamosHartosCNTE trend on Twitter. Estamos hartos means “we’re fed up”. Take a look at some:

Public disapproval also derives from the growing awareness that the teaching profession is a union racket, not a public service. Much of the credit for this awakening goes to the free press, which has been doggedly exposing corruption for more than a decade. Stories like the one in 2008 about a teachers union leader who was getting ready to award 59 brand new Hummers to top union officials have shocked the nation. Mexicans have also learned that tens of thousands of “teachers” on school payrolls are actually working as professional union activists. These full-time political operatives are trained at Mexico’s teachers’ university where they are indoctrinated in hard-left ideology and are guaranteed a job upon graduation.

The reform is only a start,

Plenty of pitfalls remain. Mexicans are still waiting for a transparency law that would force unions to make their financing public. And opponents of transparency managed to remove the requirement that teacher performance evaluations be made public. The education-advocacy nongovernmental organization Mexicanos Primero points out that this makes it “practically impossible” for citizens to verify whether the teacher is doing the job.

The education-sector overhaul includes the creation of a new, federal Institute of Evaluation, which will prepare the exams and evaluate the performance of teachers at least once over a four-year period. The first round of exams is expected in July of next year.
…
The reforms also seek to curb the power of unions. In some states, sections of the union decide who is hired and fired, and some teaching positions are essentially granted for life, and can be passed on to relatives or even sold.

An education reform and another that would increase competition in the telecommunications industry, which is heavily dominated by a single company, have won legislative approval. And progress has been made on others, including one reform that would bolster access to credit by small businesses. But observers say some of the most contentious challenges lie ahead, especially energy and tax reform.

Passing the education bill was crucial for Mr. Peña Nieto. If pressure from the street demonstrations had blocked the passage of the bill, the rest of Mr. Pena’s reform agenda, which includes a tax revamp to boost the country’s revenue, could have been jeopardized.

Mexico’s political establishment, the president’s foes, the media, and the international community are watching carefully whether Peña Nieto will defend the pillar of his education proposal in the face of fierce resistance. Unless he musters the courage to salvage his reforms, he will embolden the populist left, demoralize advocates of reform, and undermine his plan for building a more competitive Mexico — particularly the modernization of the energy sector.

Frankly, the legacy of Peña Nieto’s six-year mandate hangs in the balance.

Mexico could become a ‘jaguar’ economy, similar to the fast-growing ‘tiger’ economies of East Asia, if its newly-elected government succeeds in kick-starting lackluster growth with ambitious economic reforms, Nomura said.

There’s a huge protest scheduled for tomorrow. The fate of our hemisphere hangs on how this is resolved.

Teachers in Guerrero, one of Mexico’s poorest states, are defying Mr. Peña Nieto’s administration by opposing the education measure signed into law in February, which for the first time requires teachers to be evaluated by an autonomous body. Those that fail the evaluation can be dismissed.

Last week, tens of thousands of teachers, some armed with metal bars and Molotov cocktails, marched in Guerrero’s capital, Chilpancingo. They again blocked for hours the highway that connects Mexico City with the Pacific port of Acapulco, hurting a key economic and tourist hub. The demonstrations have been held sporadically since the overhaul bill was signed.

Since this is affecting some 42,000 students, parents are holding lessons in parks, public squares and restaurants, which in itself may be hazardous,

Initial plans to start the lessons Monday were put off for fear of reprisals from striking teachers, and the parents association is working with state authorities to guarantee safety for the classes, he added.

The lessons would be conducted like summer-school workshops, with hundreds of children expected to attend the first classes, Mr. Castro said. The idea is to teach grade-school students mathematics, Spanish and other basics, and the parents association is trying to get local education authorities to give credit for completed work.

For now,

Mexico consistently ranks near the bottom among the members of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development in education indicators such as average years in school and student skills, including reading.

The photo in the WSJ article is captioned, “Protesting teachers on Thursday forced their way into the Congress building in Chilpancingo where lawmakers were debating education legislation.”

What I see is masked men breaking into a door. Thugs hired by the teachers’ union? Or are they really teachers?

An education is a passport: It is not the reason to take a journey. It is not a ticket. It is not a destination. It is a tool to help you get where you want to be. At the same time, as a passport can be used for ID even when you’re not traveling, an education has a twofold effect: As you learn, you simultaneously expand your opportunities to learn. I found this out at a very young age.

I was born and raised in Puerto Rico in a family with a lot of relatives in traditional professions – medicine, law, academics, teaching – and from a young age I was encouraged to read. In a short time, I became a voracious, indiscriminate reader of anything and everything that was in front of me, in English or in Spanish. Be it National Geographic, Bohemia (definitely not a magazine for young readers), books, The World Book Encyclopedia, newspapers, or utility bills. I was expected to do well in school and to obtain a college degree. I also observed that in my large extended family, some had not followed the traditional professions, and they also had attained comfortably middle-class, stable, livelihoods.

When it was time to choose a college major, it was time to ask myself: What were the traits that my successful relatives shared in their educational backgrounds? The first thing was, they all had learned something useful for which there was a demand. The pre-baby boom generation needed not only teachers and professors, doctors, and engineers, but also workers who knew the technology of the day. While they entered fields and occupations that interested them, they kept sight of how their interests would fit the employment landscape. They had passports while they kept sight of the trip.

Each of my successful relatives set out to learn all they could about their jobs and their fields.

They could express themselves clearly and professionally to co-workers, colleagues and clients. They all had made their own learning.

As they made their own learning, they identified and explored the new opportunities that learning opened up to them.

The most successful: never stopped learning.

As in any journey, you need to identify your vision when you decide to pursue an education. In college, I majored in marketing and economics because I’m interested in business and money, and because those two fields afforded flexibility in employment options. I pursued an MBA at night while working full-time, with my employer’s encouragement. My long-term goal has been to remain flexible. I have worked in retailing, real estate, insurance, and on the board of a local non-profit, which led to new opportunities in education-related fields. This in turn, led to a deeper interest in literacy and literature. Recently, I completed an online certificate program in English-to-Spanish translation, which supplements my blogging and my teaching at a local language school.

As you need to renew your passport, you also need to update your skills. By updating your skills, you stay ahead of the competition and become a more valuable worker, and you become more challenged in your job and in your everyday life. You are taking advantage of new opportunities. You are excited about the new blessings your work brings you and your loved ones. Your loved ones, in turn, become inspired by you.

Your purpose becomes your deeds. And it all started when you set out to get that passport for your journey: the education you had been thinking about.

Change is inevitable. But, making change happen when you want it to can be hard. And when you want to make a real change, you need to learn something new. Because education is the key to change, Kaplan has spent 75 years re-writing the rules of education. Because they believe that education is not one size fits all. A system focused on the needs of individuals can give students the power to change their lives. Kaplan wasn’t satisfied with the status quo, and you shouldn’t be either. To jumpstart your change, we encourage you to watch Kaplan’s video series, Visionary Voices, to hear the latest insights on emerging trends from notable thought leaders; participate in Kaplan’s ADVANCE: Career. Education. You. group on LinkedIn to connect with professionals committed to life-long learning; and connect with students, alumni and educational professionals at StudentAdvisor.com, Kaplan’s one-stop-shop for the latest education news, reviews, and advice.

I’d love to hear from you and learn how education has given you the power to change! Leave a comment below and be entered to win a $100 VISA gift card!

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